Old Reid, Cahill homes fail to sell

Wayne County officials sold 74 properties during a tax sale Tuesday, but not among them was the former Reid Hospital campus on Chester Boulevard.

The sale at the County Administration Building brought in $359,945 to county coffers, which goes toward paying off property taxes owed.

Wayne County Commissioner Ken Paust said he was pleased with the sale but not surprised a buyer failed to come forward for the former Reid property.

“It would have been nice, but we didn’t expect it to sell,” he said. “The number of bidders was slightly lower than our last sale, but the numbers for what they bid were higher.

“And that’s good because that’s money coming back in to pay taxes owed and this sale will return these properties to the tax roles,” Paust said.

But the Reid property remains a nightmare for the city and county.

County officials agreed to sell the campus’ six parcels of land as a whole to avoid having someone buy property along Chester Boulevard that might be more attractive for development.

However, no one bid on the land.

The current owner, Spring Grove Development LLC, owes $501,251.87 in back property taxes and penalties.

Spring Grove Development stopped paying property tax on the old Reid campus in 2011.

Two properties owned by John Cahill of Eaton, Ohio, also were on the tax sale list and also did not sell Tuesday.

Cahill has waged an almost two-year fight with the city of Richmond over the properties, 1225 S. A St. and 120 N. 14th St. Both are abandoned and blighted and the city has ordered Cahill to repair or remove both.

Cahill has refused and has filed lawsuits, appeals and challenges against the city over a 17-month period.

The city hopes to take bids in October to tear down the South A Street house. Both vacant buildings require an asbestos study and that has delayed the demolition process.

Asbestos also is a concern at the former Reid campus. City and county officials have formed a partnership to begin the cleanup investigation.

The city received grants from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency through the Indiana Department of Environmental Management and has hired a firm to do initial and secondary contamination investigations.

The city is hoping to get the results of the secondary study, which included a water study, in October.

The county also filed a lawsuit against the owners in 2013 to try to bring them back to Indiana to answer for the back taxes, but there has been no progress on that.

Paust said about $1 million in property taxes was owed on the 151 properties that were offered for sale Tuesday.

“But when you consider that $600,000 of that number was owed by the owners of the former Reid property and the former Warfield Oil Co. property (on North F Street), I would say it was a pretty successful sale,” he said.

Staff writer Bill Engle: (765) 973-4481 or bengle@pal-item.com. Follow him on Twitter at http://twitter.com/billengle_PI.

At a Glance

Seventy-four properties were sold at Tuesday’s real property sale bringing in $359,945.10.

One hundred and fifty-one properties were offered for sale.

The original list for the sale, published in August, included 345 properties. Owners of 113 properties came in and paid back taxes in advance of the sale.

Another 81 properties were removed from the sale Tuesday because of bankruptcies, owners agreeing to go on payment plans or because of discrepancies in legal descriptions of properties.

Local attorney Wayne Greeson bought 36 of the properties Tuesday for investors both in and out of Indiana.